


Back to Alcomback (Kuebiko)

by AborigineBighorn



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Original Work
Genre: Avada Kedavra, Death Eaters, Flashbacks, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-26
Updated: 2018-06-26
Packaged: 2019-05-29 01:45:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15062357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AborigineBighorn/pseuds/AborigineBighorn
Summary: A Death Eater pays a visit back to his home town.Kuebiko: (noun) A feeling of exhaustion caused by acts of senseless violence.





	Back to Alcomback (Kuebiko)

**Author's Note:**

> The first story of the Ponberryforth trilogy, which explains Pontilier's origins.

Tucked away in the mountainous unknown of Northern Britain, there were the ruins of the village of Alcombak. A grey fog hugged the ground, enveloping the cobble road in a misty blanket. Rain drizzled from above, falling through the branches of an ancient evergreen, filling the vacant woods with the whispers of a storm. A stone clocktower stood in the distance with a hunch, as if it would groan over and fall. The streetlights were dim, never to turn on again. 

The place had become a ghost town, and not a soul had visited the village in years. 

A man creeps along the pathways of an overgrown park, silent except for the crunch of his polished shoes on the fallen leaves. Not even a murder of crows was to be found in the remaining shrubbery. There was only him, nature's tears, and the brick walls of empty abodes. 

At least, that's all there was  _now._

Finding a rotten bench to sit on, he shrugs off his jacket and relaxes his shoulders. There was something about being alone that gifted him a sense of total control. He could imagine his footsteps commanding the thunder's wrath, and his breath turning the breeze into a howling wind. He could kick his pretty shoes into the bubbling creek without being scolded, like he did when he grew up in this village and the crows were his dearest friends. 

There was no one around to tell him otherwise. 

His gaze falls on the distant shadow of a tall, looming building. As the storm moves across the sky, he sees the face of a clock, cracked and yellowed by time. Its wiry hands were stuck at midnight, as they had been for nineteen years.

Had it really been so long?

He shakes his head, looking away from the ancient monument. He thinks those hands stopped only yesterday, but his surroundings begged to differ. His hair lost its midnight shine and was now grey with flecks of raven. The creek was nothing more than a smelly, muddy bank. Sage ivy snaked at the legs of the very bench he was sitting on, thorns poking his ankles. 

As he picks the spikes away from his skin, he spots a silvery tree branch that seemed to be untouched by the rest of the village's decay. It rested at the base of a giant evergreen, covered in dew. There was a clearing around its trunk, as if someone had taken a nap there for a long, long time. 

And he suddenly remembers-

"Flee! My youngest son has gone mad!"

Ignoring his dad's cry, Phineas Pontilier prowled across the town square, a burst of envy green racing in all directions, a silver branch clutched in his grasp. The thump of his father hitting the marble fountain was both an anticlimactic and horrific sight. His mother, shrieking like a banshee, scrambled away like a mouse, running for her life.

Why did his mother always turn away from him?

Rage filling his trembling hands, he took off after her, kicking aside the old man's still body as he thundered through the street. He could hear the cries of crows, and the cries of children, melting into one sound. One youngest son's anguish and anger paved the road he ran on. An operatic, yet disgusted in his head whined, a reminder of what sent him into such a fit. 

_"What a frightening wretch of a son we have! We ought to lock him in his room with the dead crows from the roof! Bring me the key right now, would you, Hendrix dear?"_

His grasp on the wand grew tighter, as he skidded to a stop on the gravel. Mrs. Pontilier had tripped in the middle of a courtyard, her withering form overshadowed by the clocktower that had stopped ticking. She saw the deathly glare on her son's face and gasped, shaking her head. Her expression was scrunched up in denial, like the demon before her was just a figment of nightmare. A nightmare she'd tried to raise for eighteen years. 

"My husband . . . my Hendrix . . ." She whimpered, holding something small and key-like close to her neck. 

"Yes, your husband." Phineas curtly spoke, pointing his wand at her. "He's been out with more women that you never knew about." His jaw clenched, as he fumbled for the last words to say to his mother. 

"No . . . not my Hendrix . . . he would not have-"

"But he did!" He snapped, daring to take one step closer. "Dad was a sneaky man . . . Dad was a neglectful man . . ." He raised his wand for the last time, muttering the fateful curse under his breath. "Dad died."

The final green bolt struck her like lightning, snapping against the stone brick as it came and went. Mrs. Pontilier was knocked to the edge of the courtyard. She stopped twitching and trembling. Phineas' chest heaved as he tried to regain composure. But his eyes remained on the lifeless, still figure of his mother. 

His arm felt numb, his own heartbeat the only sound still ringing in his ears. A weight pressed down on his shoulders, like a gust of wind ushering him to lay down too. His eyes struggled to stay open. 

When he turned around, he didn't notice the smoke rising from the houses, or the stench of his carnage. He didn't think twice as he tripped over the soot-covered foot of a child laying on the pavement, or hear the weeps of a young boy just like him at his feet. Because when a man is tired, he only seems to remember the most insignificant of details before his eyes shut tight. 

An evergreen that escaped unscathed from his rampage stood tall in front of him. If he rested here, he would be concealed by the dark forestry. The black soot on his cheeks would hide his white hair. 

He limped to the base of the tree, dropped his wand, and slumped against its trunk. The silver branch fell to his side, shimmering in the emerging sun. His head hit the bark, and he was out cold. 

"Ah." He whispers, breaking back into reality. That was where he fell asleep. That was where he succumbed to exhaustion after saying goodbye to his parents. That was where he slept after setting this village ablaze, covering himself in smoke and others in tragedy.  _That_ was the tree untouched by time. It was bed for a madman. 

It's time he should be going. He hasn't the time to revisit old childhood hometowns and look at trees. His feet moved on their own, taking him back to the village entrance, shuffling past the dried-up fountain, rusted coins sitting in its basin. 

He turns around, stealing one last glance at the putrid entrance sign. In maggot-eaten letters, it read, "WELCOME TO ALCOMBAK."

"'I'll come back', that's what I promised, right?"


End file.
